Developer : Activision
Release date : November 9, 2010
Synopsis :
Call of Duty: Black Ops is a 2010 first-person shooter game developed by Treyarch and published by Activision. It was released worldwide in November 2010 for Microsoft Windows, the PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360, with a separate version for Nintendo DS developed by n-Space. Aspyr later released the game for OS X in September 2012. It is the seventh title in the Call of Duty series and the sequel to Call of Duty: World at War.
Set in the 1960s during the Cold War, the game’s campaign follows CIA operative Alex Mason as he attempts to recall certain memories in combat in order to locate a numbers station. This station is due to transmit broadcasts to sleeper agents who are bound to use chemical weapons across the United States. Mason and CIA operative Jason Hudson are the game’s main playable characters, as well as Red Army soldier Viktor Reznov in one mission. Locations featured in the game include Cuba, Laos, Vietnam, the Soviet Union, the United States, Hong Kong, and the Arctic Circle. The multiplayer of Black Ops features multiple objective-based game modes that are playable on 14 different maps included with the game. Improvements to loadout options and killstreak rewards are made. A form of virtual currency, COD Points, allows players to purchase weapons and customization options for their in-game character, as well as attachments and customization options for their weapon.
Development for the game began in 2009. It runs an enhanced version of the IW 3.0 engine used in World at War. The improvements made allowed for bigger campaign levels to be made as well as enhanced lighting. Treyarch focused specifically on Black Ops during development; they were developing two games at once while making World at War. Different teams within the company focused on a certain game mode. Music was composed by Sean Murray, with music by The Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Eminem, and Avenged Sevenfold appearing in the game. The marketing of the game began in April 2010.
The game received generally positive reviews from critics with praise for its story, voice-acting, darker tone and multiplayer modes, although some criticized it for its lack of innovation, linear gameplay, and technical issues. Among other awards and nominations, Call of Duty: Black Ops was nominated Game of the Year by numerous media outlets and award shows, including the Interactive Achievement Awards, British Academy Games Awards, and Spike Video Game Awards. Within 24 hours of going on sale, the game had sold more than 5.6 million copies, breaking the record set by its predecessor Modern Warfare 2 by some 2.3 million copies. The game had sold over 25 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling games of all time. A sequel, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, was released in 2012. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, set between Black Ops and Black Ops II, was released in November 2020.
On April 17, 1961, Mason, Woods, and Bowman take part in Operation 40 to assassinate Fidel Castro and assist the CIA sponsored Cuban exiles during the Bay of Pigs Invasion. Mason unwittingly shoots Castro’s body double, but he elects to stay behind to protect the extraction plane with Woods and Bowman aboard from an oncoming blockade, before being captured by the real Castro, who hands him over to the Soviet Union. Imprisoned at Vorkuta Gulag, Mason befriends former Red Army soldier Viktor Reznov. Reznov gives Mason the identities of their enemies: Major General Nikita Dragovich, his right-hand man Colonel Lev Kravchenko, and ex-Nazi scientist Friedrich Steiner, who defected to the Soviet Union. On October 29, 1945, Reznov, Petrenko, and their platoon were sent to extract Steiner from a Nazi base in the Arctic. However, they were betrayed by Dragovich, who tested Steiner’s nerve gas known as “Nova 6” on Petrenko’s squad, killing them. Reznov was spared the same fate when British commandos, also interested in acquiring Nova 6, attacked the Soviets. In the chaos, Reznov destroyed Nova 6 and escaped, only to be captured by the Soviets and sent to Vorkuta. The Soviets later recreated Nova 6 with the help of a British scientist, Daniel Clarke.
By 1963, Mason and Reznov spark an uprising to flee the prison. Reznov stays behind luring the guards away to facilitate Mason’s escape. On November 10, 1963, Mason meets with President John F. Kennedy, who authorizes a mission to assassinate Dragovich. Mason, Woods, Bowman, and Weaver are dispatched to the Baikonur Cosmodrome to disrupt the Soviet space program and eliminate members of “Ascension”, a Soviet program giving sanctuary to Nazi scientists in exchange for their knowledge. The team destroys the Soyuz spacecraft, while Woods apparently kills Dragovich in a car explosion with a commandeered BTR.
On January 21, 1968, Mason’s team is sent to Vietnam as part of MACV-SOG. After defending Khe Sanh from a North Vietnamese assault, they recover a dossier on Dragovich from a Russian defector being held by the North Vietnamese Army in Hue City during the Tet Offensive. The defector is revealed to be Reznov, who joins them as they penetrate Laos to recover a Nova 6 shipment from a downed Soviet plane. They are captured by Viet Cong and Spetznaz forces at the crash site. Bowman is executed, but Woods and Mason manage to escape, hijacking a Mi-24 Hind and crippling the Ho Chi Minh trail before rescuing Reznov from Kravchenko’s base. They confront Kravchenko and Woods stabs him, but Kravchenko pulls the pins off of grenades strapped to himself, forcing Woods to sacrifice himself by pushing both himself and Kravchenko out of a window. In the aftermath, Mason presumes the two dead.
Meanwhile, Hudson and Weaver interrogate Clarke in Kowloon City. Clarke reveals the location of a hidden facility in Mount Yamantau before being killed by Dragovich’s men. Hudson and Weaver destroy the base and receive a transmission from Steiner requesting to meet at Rebirth Island, as Dragovich has begun killing loose ends. Mason and Reznov head there to assassinate Steiner at the same time, succeeding just as Hudson and Weaver arrive. Unknown to Mason, Hudson and Weaver had witnessed Mason carrying out the act alone while declaring himself to be Reznov, prompting the pair to interrogate him.
Dragovich has sleeper cells placed within each US State capital which, when ordered by the numbers broadcast, will release the Nova 6 gas. As a result, the U.S., now at DEFCON 2, is preparing a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, which would result in World War III and Mutual Assured Destruction. Hudson reveals that while Mason was imprisoned at Vorkuta, Dragovich reverse-engineered the C.I.A.’s MKUltra program and brainwashed him to serve as a Soviet sleeper agent and assassinate Kennedy. Reznov died during the breakout, and the Soviet defector in Hue had actually been killed before Mason reached him. Mason’s visions of Reznov are a result of dissociative identity disorder caused by the brainwashing program. Prior to the Vorkuta uprising, Reznov reprogrammed Mason to assassinate Dragovich, Kravchenko, and Steiner instead. With Steiner’s death, Mason is the only person left with any knowledge of the location of Dragovich’s broadcast station, from which he transmits instructions to his sleeper cells via numerical sequences, having additionally had the knowledge of how to decipher the numbers implanted into his mind at Vorkuta. Mason finally remembers the location of the broadcast station: a Russian cargo ship named Rusalka off the coast of Cuba. An assault on the Rusalka begins, with Mason and Hudson infiltrating the underwater submarine base protecting the ship. Hudson calls in the United States Navy to destroy the Rusalka. Mason and Hudson confront Dragovich in the lower levels of the facility, where Mason strangles and drowns Dragovich before escaping with Hudson. They regroup with Weaver, who declares victory.
Archive footage of President Kennedy before his assassination on November 22, 1963, is shown, revealing Mason was among onlookers who watched Kennedy disembark from Air Force One at Love Field. His presence, and Dragovich’s taunt before his death, suggest that Mason may have carried out his initial programming.
Source : Wikipedia
